Legal and security experts warned this Friday about the unprecedented challenges posed by gender violence in the digital environment, which they have described as an "omnipresent" form of aggression, also demanding a specific response from judges and police regarding this type of conduct.
The reflections were raised in a round table at the summer courses of the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM) in San Lorenzo de El Escorial, led by the Government delegate against gender violence, Carmen Martínez Perza, where the speakers examined this violence and its approach from a judicial and police perspective.
Prosecutor María Eugenia Prendes Menéndez focused her presentation on the legal approach, emphasizing that it is not an isolated phenomenon, but rather an "extension of gender violence" that women and girls have historically suffered.
Prendes explained that technologies not only serve as a vehicle for dissemination but also amplify the "harmful" effect in an "exaggeratedly enormous" way, allowing the aggression to be "constant" and blurring the boundaries of time and space. This "ubiquity," she indicated, causes the victim to lack a safe place, even within her own home.
Definition and international framework
The prosecutor lamented the absence of a "consensual international definition" of digital gender violence, something that "hinders" the creation of a homogeneous regulation. Nevertheless, she highlighted Spain's leadership, where the State Pact against Gender Violence has incorporated this modality transversally since 2017, with a review scheduled for 2025 aimed at strengthening early detection among the young population.
Regarding criminal prosecution, she emphasized the relevance of "cyber evidence," warning of its vulnerability and the ease of manipulating it through tools like 'fake chat.'
"Early preservation is the most relevant," she stressed. Therefore, she advocated for the adoption of precautionary measures that allow for the immediate cessation of the aggression and the use of "advanced investigative tools," including the remote access of computer devices and the role of the undercover computer agent to infiltrate sexual exploitation networks operating on the Internet.
From the police perspective, the commissioner and head of the Central Brigade of the Family and Women Attention Unit (UFAM), Eva Gutiérrez Carrera, has offered the operational perspective, emphasizing that her unit has protocols and technological means comparable to those of specialized units in organized crime.
Myth of romantic love and adolescents
In her intervention, Gutiérrez has warned about the "escalation of violence" among adolescents, where access to passwords and devices of the partner becomes "normalized" under the "myth of romantic love."
The head of the UFAM has also stressed the importance of "preserving digital evidence," as many victims, in an attempt at "emotional protection," choose to delete messages or images, which ultimately destroys the evidentiary support of the complaint. For this reason, she has asked victims to take screenshots that include URL, date, and time, in order to avoid possible manipulations.
The magistrate of the First Section of the Provincial Court of Gipuzkoa, Julián García Marcos, has reviewed the doctrine of the Supreme Court, highlighting resolutions that incorporate the gender perspective in crimes such as 'stalking' or harassment, understood as an extension of control over the victim after the breakup of the relationship.
García Marcos has pointed out that the High Court already recognizes "virtual sexual abuse," in which the superior position of the aggressor online and anonymity "aggravate the harm to sexual freedom, even without physical contact."
The magistrate has also expressed his concern about "ultrafalsifications" or synthetic pornography generated through Artificial Intelligence (AI), mentioning cases in which the faces of victims are used on foreign bodies to produce sexual content without consent. He concluded by pointing out that these behaviors are being classified not only as crimes of producing abusive material but also as serious attacks against the moral integrity of women.